


You Would Have Loved Him

by Ineia



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Light Angst, My Unit | Byleth Has Emotions, Sad with a Happy Ending, Tea Parties, and she's learning to deal with them!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:06:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25930090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ineia/pseuds/Ineia
Summary: Turning away from him, she looked out to the sky, where the sun was beginning to lower, painting the clouds in orange and magenta tones.  “What’s your mother like, Claude?” Byleth finally asked quietly.After Abyss and Jeralt's death, Byleth reflects on mothers with Claude.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 14
Kudos: 112





	You Would Have Loved Him

**Author's Note:**

> For maximum emotions and if you'd like to, I recommend listening to this cover of the song [Children and Art](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7x9_qT_GYA) from the musical Sunday in the Park with George as you read. Also, this includes spoilers for the DLC!

Byleth was different after Abyss.

Claude would have noticed it even if he hadn’t caught her staring off into the distance when she was supposed to be observing drills in the training yard. The Professor usually watched things with her trademark blank stare, so, if she was zoning out, it would be impossible to tell. But her face was not so neutral in the days after Abyss. There was a wistfulness in her expression, a melancholy behind her eyes.

No one else seemed to have noticed this shift—perhaps no one else was paying such close attention to her. Claude had stayed after a lecture in the week following their return to the surface to ask if she was alright. Tilting her head slightly in confusion, Byleth replied she was fine. Either she didn’t know how visible her sadness was, or her troubled emotions were subconscious and she didn’t even realize their full extent. Claude let it be, waving off his concern as nothing. He still kept an eye on his dear teacher, but her forlorn gazes seemed to fade with time. He worried less.

Then, Jeralt died. Byleth’s entire demeanor changed. Not subtly, not in pensive glances and soft sighs. No, there was nothing soft about her grief. Everyone was aware of it. Her pain was open and raw, written across her face, visible through her tense shoulders and dark circles below her eyes.

She didn’t speak much. Not that Byleth was ever a chatty type, but she had begun to open up with the help of her students. It felt like, overnight, Byleth made a defeated retreat to her silent ways. It was like her first days at the monastery, but, instead of awkwardness underlying her quiet bearing, there was darkness. When he first met the Professor, her taciturn manner seemed to come from not knowing what to say. Now, her silence spoke for itself—there was nothing to speak of but loss.

Not that there were many chances to talk with his dear Teach, either. She spent much of her time by herself—in her dorm, in the training yard, walking about the monastery, sitting in the graveyard. In the weeks after, she didn’t have tea with any student, share a meal with anyone. Lorenz hadn’t been able to coax the Professor to join him and Hilda for Choir practice, and the fishkeeper and greenhouse keeper had stopped Claude as he walked by to ask how the Professor was doing. She hadn’t been by either of her usual haunts in weeks. The gatekeeper also left his post to find Claude, asking if the Professor was alright. Claude knew then that things were dire.

Byleth still held lectures, though Claude could see she was about as motivated as her students—that is to say, not motivated at all. Claude knew that this couldn’t go on for much longer or the Golden Deer would fall behind in their education. They were far ahead of the other two houses, if how handily they won the tournaments was anything to go off of… how long could the edge last, however, if they weren’t really learning?

Still, the Professor took them out to rout bandits to hone their skills for several weekends in a row, and Claude could see and feel the improvements in himself and his classmates. These battles revealed a raw tenacity Claude had not realized the Professor had. Byleth had always been protective of her students, but she now fought as though she were shielding her own family from harm. The thought pulled at Claude’s heart, because, perhaps, the Deer were the closest thing Byleth had left to a family.

As the month wore on, there were signs of Byleth healing. The fishkeeper reported to Leonie that Byleth had come by in the evening and fished for an hour. The next day, she ate a two-fish sauté with Marianne and Hilda, which the entire class celebrated once Byleth had returned to her room. The gatekeeper excitedly had something to report to Claude the day after that—Byleth had come by to see how things were going.

Dedue knocked on his door one evening a few days later.

“I understand your house is concerned about the Professor’s condition. His Highness and the Blue Lions share your concern,” Dedue said from where he stood near Claude’s door after Claude let him in. “This is why I was relieved to meet the Professor in the greenhouse today. We watered the flowers together, and she asked me about training. She picked some onions. I thought you would appreciate this information.” His expression was strangely soft for such a firm personality. Then again, Claude has always felt a kinship with Dedue as an outsider—not that Dedue knew Claude considered himself as such.

Claude could have hugged him for delivering this news, but, wisely, decided against it. Instead, he smiled, a real one. Usually, only the Professor got those.

“Thank you, Dedue. That is great news to hear. I’m glad our Teach has people looking out for her in all corners of the academy.”

Dedue returned the smile before giving a polite nod, making a swift exit.

The next day, before their lecture, Claude excitedly reported the greenhouse sighting to his classmates.

“I have never been so happy to hear about _onions_!” Lysithea exclaimed joyfully just as Byleth walked in.

Everyone turned to stare at her, Lysithea looking more than a little embarrassed at yelling something seemingly so random. Byleth just raised an eyebrow and walked to her desk, readying her notes. Claude thought the bags under her eyes looked better today, and the eyebrow sass was a step forward too.

After the lesson finished, Byleth asked him to stay a minute.

“What’s up, Teach?” Claude asked, leaning against a table as Byleth wiped down the chalkboard.

“Would you like to have tea today? It would have to be later this evening.”

“I would love to. Have you ever been to the field on the western side of the monastery with the great view of the town? We could have tea there, and we’d get a view of the sunset if the timing’s right.”

Byleth hummed at his plan. “Ambitious.”

“Always,” Claude replied with a smirk. “But in all honesty, I thought you might appreciate the change of scenery from the stone of monastery walls.” She nodded deeply at that.

“Alright. Come by the classroom at five and we can walk over together. I’ll bring tea.”

Claude went about his day, but he couldn’t really concentrate on anything properly. His mind couldn’t wait for his first tea time with the Professor in weeks and weeks. When he met her and they wandered over to the outskirts of the monastery, he didn’t hold back a smile at the scent of Almyran Pine Needles coming from the little basket Byleth was using to hold the pot and treats.

The tea time was more subdued than usual. They just sat on the grass and sipped at their cups, munching on the handful of pastries Byleth had thrown in the basket. She asked Claude about books he was reading, told him of strange fish she had encountered in the pond the other day, and thanked him for everything he had done for her.

“No need to thank me, Teach,” Claude said. “I haven’t done much. Especially this month, I’m not sure I’ve been there for you as much as I should have.”

Byleth shook her head. “No, I wanted some time to myself. I’ve never felt… that kind of pain before. Or any emotion that intense. It’s still so heavy and overwhelming, but each day it’s a little less overwhelming than before.”

Claude just nodded.

“And there’s also…” Byleth began, but the sentence trailed off as she seemed lost for words. Turning away from him, she looked out to the sky, where the sun was beginning to lower, painting the clouds in orange and magenta tones. “What’s your mother like, Claude?” Byleth finally asked quietly.

Claude closed his eyes and pictured his mother. What _was_ she like?

“She’s beautiful. She’s tall, just an inch shorter than me. Her eyes are like mine. Green, bright. Her hair is that kind of dirty blonde, where it could be brown if you squint. There’s some gray in it now, too. And her smile is mischievous, another thing we share. It’s like she’s about to laugh at a joke at your expense even if you haven’t done anything. She’s tough. Doesn’t accept disrespect from anyone, and she can be brutally honest. But she’s… warm. When I was younger, there were people who were terrible to me. Before I was old enough to fight back, with my words or with a blade, I’d just take the insults silently and go running for her as soon as I could. Unfortunately, she couldn’t stop it, but she would hold me and tell me—”

Claude stopped. He found his voice went dry at this part. Surprising, he never thought he was choked up about this. Maybe it was because he felt the weight of describing a mother’s comfort to Byleth. Maybe it was because he hadn’t seen his mother in nearly two years. He’d write her a letter tonight. He swallowed the emotion in his throat and continued.

“She told me she loved me. She told me that when I was born, all she wanted was for me to be healthy. That she prayed I’d be healthy every day before I was born. And, if I was healthy, then she would ask the gods for me to be kind. And if I was kind, she’d ask for me to be smart. Then, if she was blessed to have all that, that I’d be handsome. And she’d end by saying she thought she was the luckiest mother in the world that somehow all her prayers were heard. I don’t think I’m all that kind, you know, but when everything and everyone seemed to despise me, her whispering all the ways she was so happy I was who I was… it made me feel like I always had someone in my corner, even if the whole rest of world wasn’t.”

“Did she hold you when you were older?” Byleth asked. Her mournful tone suggested she wasn’t asking out of a personal interest in his childhood. Instead, he could hear her desire to fill the void in her heart of what a mother might be like.

Claude hummed. “Not as much. I always said I was too old to get hugs from my mother. She occasionally did it anyway to tease me, but she also knew I didn’t want to be perceived as weak. But she was there with me in so many other ways. Helped me learn about my Crest, hone my fighting skills, craft schemes…” he trailed off. He did have some allies in his homeland, but his mother was his most steadfast. His heart aches a bit thinking of her, thousands of miles away. “The night before I left for Fódlan, though, she held me like I was a little boy again. She rubbed circles on my back. She always had told me stories of Fódlan and Leicester, preparing me for becoming heir to House Riegan and all the politics it entailed, but that evening she told me of the things she loved about the country. Things she couldn’t wait for me to see. Stone palaces with tall arches and grand staircases, verdant forests everywhere, huge canals in cities, flowing rivers passing through the countryside, and her favorite, stunning pink skies of sunsets in the summer. Sitting with my mom like that, I felt like I was a little kid again, listening to her tell stories in her soft storytelling voice.”

Byleth’s eyes were squeezed shut, as if she was trying to imagine it and struggling. Then, her face relaxed, a kind of surrender falling across it. She opened her eyes and turned to Claude.

“Thank you. It’s… I have never been able to express emotions well. When I was younger, everything felt… muted. Like I was underwater, all my feelings were above the surface. I didn’t quite realize that until coming here,” Byleth said. “But nothing I’ve felt since coming here has compared to this grief. It’s all-consuming.”

Byleth looked like she had more to say, so Claude waited as she found the words. The sun was lower now, the sky growing beautiful and bright, clouds seeming to glow in the dusk.

“The last time I felt anything even… close to this intense was in Abyss. Right as we saw her. My mother. To see her peaceful face, and her body perfectly preserved. I don’t—didn’t look anything like Jeralt. Everyone remarked on it, though I never really minded. I knew he was my father. When I saw her, and saw so much of her in my face and my hair… I suddenly felt like I was missing something I never knew I didn’t have.

“When I was a child, I felt the absence of a mother at times. Seeing mothers in villages with their children, picking them up and kissing them on their foreheads, ushering them inside as it got dark. Sometimes, there was a tug in my heart, like I wanted that too. But mostly, it didn’t bother me. My father did his best, but he wasn’t too affectionate. And I didn’t really ask for that affection. Most of the time, I didn’t want it.

“But now that he’s gone too, I’ve been thinking about everything. How little I felt, how little I wanted. Why didn’t I want anything? Why didn’t I want a mother to hold me and tell me she loved me? Why didn’t I ask? Why was everything so far away?”

Claude was just listening, but he titled his head at the last question. “Far away?”

“My emotions, feelings, desires—they were always so far away. Distant. Aelfric told me my mother was the same. Trouble with emotions. Until she got to know my father, and then she began to smile. It seems silly, but when he told me that, I was so... relieved. That I wasn’t some strange, heartless thing. Well, you read the diary, maybe I am heartless, literally, but as long as I can feel things, then I don’t mind having no heartbeat.

“Even with the relief, there was this ache. If she had lived, would she have learned to feel even more? Taught me to reach my emotions before age twenty? I suppose it doesn’t matter. She’s long gone. My father is gone too. I… I just miss him so much. And I miss her. Even though I never knew her, I miss her.”

“I haven't lost a parent yet, let alone both of them, so I can't even begin to understand how you must be feeling...” Claude finally said, “But they’ll always be with you, as I’m sure someone has told you already.”

Byleth looked at him with blank eyes. Had no one told her that? Really?

“Well, if no one has told you, Teach, I’ll be the first. I don’t know how you feel about the Goddess, or them watching over you, or that kind of thing, but your parents live in you. When you look in the mirror, seeing traces of your mother in your reflection, that’s her standing with you. When you swing your sword in battle, like your father taught you, that’s him fighting by your side. When you remember them both, when you grieve them, when they cross your mind, they are with you. In that way, they’ll never be truly gone,” Claude explained.

Byleth stared at him for a long time before a small, thoughtful smile formed on her lips. She looked beautiful, slightly silhouetted against the brilliant sunset illuminating the sky behind her. Claude thought of the smiles she seemed to direct at him more and more often, just like this one. Claude thought of the night of the ball, a day before Byleth’s whole world turned upside down, how she looked as beautiful then as she did now, how her nervous smile transformed into a delighted one as she danced with him. Claude thought of how she found him in the Goddess Tower a few hours later, how he asked her to share in the ambitions he had. Claude thought of his heart racing and sincere smiles appearing on his face in all these moments.

Perhaps it was wrong to be thinking of all these things when Byleth was no doubt working through her grief. But how could he not with that smile? He smiled back, true and happy.

After that, they ate some of the pastries and just enjoyed the view in a comfortable quiet. After a while, as the sun was nearly gone, Claude stretched his arms and stood up.

“Are you ready to head back, Teach? It’ll be dark pretty soon.”

“I actually think I might stay out here a while. I feel very tranquil, and I think some time to myself in the fresh air will do me good. But you can head back, I know you’re busy.”

He was busy, but he would stay out here with her all night if she wished it. She wanted to be alone to enjoy the moment, though, and he didn’t blame her. It was a perfect night. He offered to carry back her basket, but she politely declined. After thanking her for the invite, Claude returned to his dorm room. He shoved some books off his bed as he prepared to climb in it, but he paused, eyes catching on the spare parchment on his desk.

Soon, he found himself at his desk, pulling out a quill.

_My dear mother,_ he wrote, _I was thinking of you today_...

✦

Byleth watched the sun dip below the horizon. The smile Claude had brought her still hadn’t left yet. If her mother had only smiled with her father, and she found herself smiling around Claude… she clasped her hands in her lap. The thought made her smile further.

“You would have liked him,” she whispered into the air before pausing. “No... I’m wrong.”

Byleth imagined her mother beside her, gaze fond as she watched over her daughter. If she closed her eyes, it was almost as though she really was right at her side.

Byleth opened her eyes slowly and whispered again. “You would have _loved_ him, Mama.”

**Author's Note:**

> Writing this made me feel things OH BOY. After finishing the DLC, I was really moved by all we learned about Sitri, but I wished we got to see Byleth's reaction to all she learns of her mom. Then, I was listening to [Children and Art](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7x9_qT_GYA), which is _such_ a beautiful song, and inspiration struck me. Big thank you to my brother for beta reading and giving me tips to make it even more emo (and for being my strategic advisor during the DLC when I was ready to give up).
> 
> Also, shameless plug, I have [another claudeleth fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25390753) that's very different than this—Byleth uses divine pulse to relive her life a dozen times, and Claude is the constant in all of them—but you might like it if you enjoyed this one.
> 
> Follow [my twitter](https://twitter.com/ladyineia) for more of me feeling emotional over fire emblem three houses!!


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